Re: 10g vs. MS SQL Server

From: Howard J. Rogers <hjr_at_dizwell.com>
Date: Wed, 12 May 2004 18:43:44 +1000
Message-ID: <40a1e3b5$0$25038$afc38c87@news.optusnet.com.au>

Niall Litchfield wrote:

> "Howard J. Rogers" <hjr_at_dizwell.com> wrote in message
> news:40a18227$0$20347$afc38c87_at_news.optusnet.com.au...
>

>>Anna C. Dent wrote:
>>
>>
>>>http://www.progstrat.com/research/gems/040401rdbmscmcs.pdf
>>
>>Clearly, their comparisons on the installation front didn't involve
>>having to create a user account, set kernel parameters, create
>>installation directory structure, integrate database and listener
>>startup into the /etc/rc.d script hierarchy and other such wonders of
>>the Linux world! No wonder the Oracle installation was 54% less complex
>>than SQL Server's... they missed all the good bits out!

>
>
> I assume that they tested both pieces of software on the same machine and
> that would be a windows box.

Well, yes. I rather worked that one out (and rather hoped the tongue-in-cheek nature of my comments would be self-evident and not need spelling out).

>>Never mind that I would never assess a database on its ease of

>
> installation.
>
> And if installation were really a worry you'd be automating the install
> anyway
>
>

>>Their 'create database' time savings over SQL Server appear largely to
>>have arisen by virtue of them selecting the 'General Database' template
>>in dbca and keeping all the defaults. Hardly a real-world test.

>
>
> Oh I don't know. It's hardly an ideal test but real-world I think so.

I hope no-one puts a 'general database' template database into production.

>>And I note their tuning tests were not of the 'this report takes 10
>>minutes currently. Make it run in 5' type, but were simply of test of
>>how easy it was to run the tuning wizard on each database.

>
>
> ! It is very difficult, but not entirely hopeless, to get the timing
> information you need out of sqlserver to do this effectively. I suspect that
> someone who knew what they were doing could perform this task in a shorter
> time on 7.3.4 than you can on MSSQL2000

Well, I didn't say they would or wouldn't. Just that the test on both products was actually merely "how easy can a user invoke a tuning wizard", and not a real test of how easy it is to tune a SQL statement properly. There wasn't even a stopwatch test to see which tuning wizard did a better job or came up with better tuning suggestions.

> I'm also quite glad that they conclude that a just released software product
> is better than a 4 year old one.
>
> They don't make any mention at all of developers efficiency with the two
> products, giving 2 equally experienced programmers a web shop type spec and
> getting them to implement it, then comparing efficiency of implementation
> and efficiency of the resulting app would be a highly interesting
> experiment.

True.

Regards
HJR Received on Wed May 12 2004 - 03:43:44 CDT